All posts by Rick Tyburski - W6KKO

Dust off your radios and scrub your antennas! The next transmitter hunt is Saturday July 16 at 10:00 AM. The start location is at the intersection of highway 180 & McCall at the Park & Ride on the north east corner. Marty K6KTP is the fox for this hunt and it is a timed hunt, so the first to find the transmitter wins. Marty also advised that there will probably be a secondary transmitter near the main one, so wear some comfortable shoes.

Please arrive early to ensure your gear is in order as we want to start at 10:00 AM. Please use the K6ARP two meter repeater for voice communications. Transmitting on the hunt frequency is a faux pas, unless you are the fox.

The weather outlook is clear and sunny on Saturday with a high around 38C. Doesn’t the temperature look cooler when using celsius? After the hunt is over we typically regroup for food and beverages at a nearby restaurant.

The T-Hunt scheduled for Saturday, May 14 has been postponed. A handful of hunters are not able to make this particular hunt for different reasons. After conferring with Marty (K6KTP) who is the Fox, I am rescheduling the event for the next T-Hunt date of Saturday, July 16.

Another fine Saturday morning brought together the greatest T-Hunters in the central California area. With their batteries charged, the four teams beat the bushes and enjoyed another fine T-Hunt. The fox for this hunt was Mike (KD6LDA) who used a yagi antenna on a 10’ pole secured with a tripod. The main T-Hunt radio transmitted about five watts. The smaller low power transmitter used only 15mW and was hidden in some tall grass nearby.

The Fox for this hunt was Ken – WA6OIB & Ron – N6MTS. The starting point was from Clovis at Letterman Park. The 4 teams were Mike – KD6LDA (solo); John – K6MI (solo); Rick – W6KKO & Dennis – KI6NVG; and Rob – AE6GE & Dave – NQ6S. And finally the Fox transmitters were located at the Goldenrod Elementary School in Kerman, on the NW corners of S. Goldenrod Ave. and Kearney Blvd.

As usual, the Fox is always tasked with making the hunt a bit different and more challenging. So for this hunt we decided to use dual transmitters, on the same frequency, and modulated by the same source. Because the signal is almost all tones and CW the transmitters were set to USB modulation, with the intent of beating one carrier against the other to create a warbling signal. Well that was our theory anyway. Both radios were producing about 50 watts into separate cross-polarized yagi antennas.